J. Edgar Hoover and the American Century

The Definitive Biography of a Colossus Who Dominated American History

In 1924, when J. Edgar Hoover became the director of the FBI, he was a trim, dazzling wunderkind of the administrative state, brimming with energy and ambitious ideas for reform. Hoover transformed a failing law-enforcement backwater, riddled with scandal, into a modern machine. He believed in the power of the federal government to achieve great things for the nation and its citizens. However, he also believed that certain people, many of them communists or racial minorities or both, did not deserve to be included in that American project.

Beverly Gage's monumental work, "G-Man," explores the full sweep of Hoover's life and career, from his birth in 1895 to a modest Washington civil-service family through his death in 1972. In her nuanced and definitive portrait, Gage shows how Hoover was more than a one-dimensional tyrant and schemer who strong-armed the rest of the country into submission.

As FBI director from 1924 through his death in 1972, Hoover was a confidant, counselor, and adversary to eight U.S. presidents, four Republicans and four Democrats. Franklin Roosevelt and Lyndon Johnson did the most to empower him, yet his closest friend among the eight was fellow anticommunist warrior Richard Nixon. Hoover was not above blackmail and intimidation, but he also embodied conservative values ranging from anticommunism to white supremacy to a crusading and politicized interpretation of Christianity. This garnered him the admiration of millions of Americans.

Hoover stayed in office for so long because many people, from the highest reaches of government down to the grassroats, wanted him there and supported what he was doing, thus creating the template that the political right has followed to transform its party.

"G-Man" places Hoover back where he once stood in American political history—not at the fringes, but at the center—and uses his story to explain the trajectories of governance, policing, race, ideology, political culture, and federal power as they evolved over the course of the 20th century.

This book has been the recipient of numerous prestigious awards, including the 2023 Pulitzer Prize in Biography, the 2022 National Book Critics Circle Award in Biography, the 2023 Bancroft Prize in American History and Diplomacy, and the 43rd LA Times Book Prize in Biography. It has also been named a Best Book of 2022 by The Atlantic, The Washington Post, and Smithsonian Magazine, as well as a New York Times Top 100 Notable Books of 2022.

The Washington Post has described the book as "Masterful...an enduring, formidable accomplishment, a monument to the power of biography [that] now becomes the definitive work." The Wall Street Journal has praised it as "A nuanced portrait in a league with the best of Ron Chernow and David McCullough."

In summary, "G-Man" is a groundbreaking and definitive portrait of a colossus who dominated half a century of American history and planted the seeds for much of today's conservative political landscape. Gage's masterful work is a must-read for anyone interested in understanding the complexities and contradictions of one of the most influential figures in 20th-century American history.

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